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In our emails, sent once or twice a week, you'll receive:
• alerts on new threats to Washington's environment
• opportunities to join other Washingtonians on urgent actions
• updates on the decisions that impact our environment
• resources to help you create a cleaner, greener future

Updates

Alliance Launched To Save Bees

Sixty-five chefs, restaurant owners and other culinary leaders joined us to launch the Bee Friendly Food Alliance. Through the Alliance, chefs and restaurateurs are calling attention to the importance of bees to our food supply, the dramatic die-off of bee populations, and the need to protect our pollinators. LEARN MORE.

Citing growing evidence of pervasive lead contamination in schools’ drinking water, Environment Washington today launched a new Get the Lead Out campaign. An analysis by Environment Washington gave Washington State a grade of ‘F,’ failing to prevent children’s drinking water from becoming laced with lead at school. Environment Washington and WashPIRG are calling for swift action to ensure lead-free water in Washington’s schools and daycares.

State legislators have introduced a bill to protect kids from lead in Washington State by getting lead out of drinking water at schools and daycare centers. The bill requires water utilities to replace lead service lines at schools and early childhood programs within three years.

On January 19, a coalition environmental, public health, social justice and public interest advocates and organizations representing tens of thousands of Washingtonians responded to the Washington State Department of Ecology’s issuance of a revised concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO) general discharge permit, five years after the former permit expired. Faced with the opportunity to protect Washingtonians from industrial agriculture pollution, Ecology failed to address the four major sources of pollution from CAFOs: land application, lagoons, compost areas and animal pens. Instead, Ecology issued a problematic, two-tiered permit scheme that fails to protect our most fundamental natural resource–clean water.

A review of 16 recent analyses shows that individuals and businesses that decide to “go solar” generally deliver greater benefits to the grid and society than they receive through net metering. Decision-makers should recognize the great value delivered by distributed solar energy by preserving and expanding access to net metering and other programs that ensure fair compensation to Americans who install solar energy.

A new report by Environment Washington Research & Policy Center finds that solar panels provide pollution free energy that delivers far reaching benefits to the environment and the electric grid. The report outlines how solar panels on homes, schools and businesses often provide more benefits than they receive through programs like net metering from utilities.